Of course Fox won the adults 18-49 ratings on Tuesday night, as American Idol's 6.7 adults 18-49 rating rose 5% vs. last Thursday. That was also even with the ratings of the comparable Idol telecast last season. What surprised me is that Fox's Mobbed special drew a 3.8 rating, nearly as high as the best post-Idol Bones.

And it what's almost becoming commonplace, Univision beat NBC among adults 18-49 on the night.

The musical episode of Grey's Anatomy sang a sweetly rated tune, scoring a season second best 4.8 adults 18-49 rating, up 30% vs. last week (our polled readers nailed it). Private Practice got a tiny boost, its 2.7 rating was up a tenth from last week. Earlier in the evening, a non-musical Wipeout tumbled 17% vs. last week to a 1.9 rating.

Back after a five week layoff CBS's Thursday line up had it rough. Big Bang Theory's 3.6 adults 18-49 rating was a season low, down 5% from its last original episode. Rules of Engagement's 2.3 rating, down 18% vs. its last original episode was also a season low. CSI fell 10% vs. its last new episode to a 2.8 rating, and The Mentalist fell 3% vs. its last original episode to a 2.8 rating.

At 12:35 a.m., "Late Night with Jimmy Fallon" (1.3/4 in metered-market households) trailed CBS's "Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson" (1.5/5). In the 25 markets with Local People Meters, "Late Night" (0.5/3 in 18-49) tied "Late Late Show" (0.5/3).

At 1:35 a.m., Last Call with Carson Daly" averaged a 0.7/3 in metered-market households and a 0.3/3 in adults 18-49 in the 25 markets with local people meters.

Fast Affiliate Ratings: These first national ratings, including demographics, are available at approximately 11 AM (ET) the day after telecast, and are released to subscribing customers daily. These data, from the National People Meter sample, are strictly time-period information, based on the normal broadcast network feed, and include all programming on the affiliated stations, sometimes including network programming, sometimes not. The figures may include stations that did not air the entire network feed, as well as local news breaks or cutaways for local coverage or other programming. Fast Affiliate ratings are not as useful for live programs and are likely to differ significantly from the final results, because the data reflect normal broadcast feed patterns. For example, with a World Series game, Fast Affiliate Ratings would include whatever aired from 8-11PM on affiliates in the Pacific Time Zone, following the live baseball game, but not game coverage that begins at 5PM PT. The same would be true of Presidential debates as well as live award shows and breaking news reports.

Rating: Estimated percentage of the universe of TV households (or other specified group) tuned to a program in the average minute. Ratings are expressed as a percent.

Share (of Audience): The percent of households (or persons) using television who are tuned to a specific program, station or network in a specific area at a specific time. (See also, Rating, which represents tuning or viewing as a percent of the entire population being measured.)

Time Shifted Viewing – Program ratings for national sources are produced in three streams of data – Live, Live+Same Day (Live+SD) and Live+7 Day. Time shifted figures account for incremental viewing that takes place with DVRs which are currently in approximately 24.4% of all U.S. TV households. Live+Same Day (Live+SD) include viewing during the same broadcast day as the original telecast, with a cut-off of 3:00AM local time when meters transmit daily viewing to Nielsen for processing. Live+7 Day ratings include incremental viewing that takes place during the 7 days following a telecast.